The Way Forward (Sevilla’s Future?)

Once again, Messioronaldo has written up some of his excellent thoughts and made a great mid-week post for you all to enjoy. Be sure to join in the conversation in the comments, and if you’d like to write for Monchi’s Men, don’t hesitate to contact us.

This is complicated, very complicated. I’m glad it’s not my problem.

Tricky Problem 1

We are going to be scrapping for every point until the end of the season so there won’t be much time for experimentation. Emery will get his chance to experiment during the pre-season and that could be a giant stride forward for the team.

But he’ll need to know who’s going and who’s coming (and we’re not sure of Monchi’s future)

Celta and Mallorca are heading to the second division, the third place will be fought between Deportivo, Zaragoza and Granada. From these clubs we have Antonio Luna (Mallorca) and Javi Varas (Celta) on loan. Luna was born in Mallorca so he might be content there in the second division. If Javi Varas returns it will upset Julian who is expecting to be the second goalkeeper so Varas moved on for cash.

We also have Alexis Ruano on loan to Getafe, Bernardo Espinosa (Sporting Gijon) and Luis Alberto (Barcelona). Alexis will not return, I’m sure. There was a disagreement with the club and he accused them of favouring Martin Caceres because of a clause with his agents.

Bernardo might be a useful backup for centre defence, but strangely he’s only played 16 games for Sporting. Even if Botía and Fazio stay we need another central defender. I’m quite sure that Barca will not pay 4 million for Luis Alberto, so if the deal is not renegotiated he will return to Sevilla. (That would mean he stays or is used in a player exchange deal).

Tricky Problem 2

It seems that Beto is the only player that will surely start next season with Sevilla.

We have the following players in limbo: Stefanovic, Babá, Campaña, Del Moral, Trochowski, Cala, Botía and Rabello.

The Rabello situation must be top priority. Sell Stefanovic, Cala, Del Moral, Babá and Campaña. With Botía, I’m still trying to understand that very strange contract but I know it’s worked against him this year, when he doesn’t play Sevilla save money. But saying that, I have no idea what to do with Botía.

Sell Campaña? yes, sorry. I see a reasonably good player but I’m still waiting to see a ‘great’ Jose Campaña.
Trochowski, when he recovers, will need to learn football again. Not all of it, but he will need to integrate his ‘new leg’. If it functions OK he might still have to adjust style and posture. When he starts to kick a ball again, it will just be the start of another long phase of recuperation.

Tricky Problem 3

The budget is negative, we cannot buy anyone without selling one or more players. The eternal problem is that the market is a jigsaw puzzle, one player has to move to release the money to buy another. Much of the negotiation is ‘who blinks first’, trying to get the best deal at the last moment. How does that affect the pre-season planning? The manager ends up with an unknown asset and loses a top player.
If there are offers for Navas, Kondogbia and Negreo, which one(s) do we sell? My choice will surprise you. Navas. And I would also sell Reyes, Manu Del Moral and Rakitic. Why? Because the ‘gearbox’ mechanism between midfield and forward line still does not function. Rakitic, although he has the quality, makes too many unforced errors.

Tricky Problem 4

Who do we buy?
Over to you, I don’t know, but I would like three or four Brazilians, similar to Alves, Adriano, Fabiano and Renato (they weren’t expensive).

El Día Después

So. That was heartbreaking/frustrating/disastrous/(fill in negative adjective here). Sevilla lost a very important match which cost them a spot in a final, a guaranteed spot in Europe, AND the several million euros Europe would’ve brought, all in one game. It was frustrating for those reasons, but it was also really terrible because I think we’re all getting to a place where we really hate those colchoneros. And finally it was frustrating because the game seemed so damn winnable, and it felt like if we’d just played slightly less error-prone defense and if our finishing had been even a little bit sharper, we’d be celebrating a pretty comfortable win today. It’s not so much a bitter pill as an entire meal of bitter chewable pills.

Anyway, I woke up this morning wondering where we sit now, what goals we should now have for the season, and what we learned. Here are a few of my thoughts, and I’d love to hear yours:

• Antonio Reyes is worse than just awful; he’s wildly inconsistent and offers a fleeting glimpse of brilliance just often enough to merit inclusion in important matches. If he didn’t play well every 8 matches he’d never get on the field so he could flippantly lose possession all the time. I would prefer this–I would prefer he always sucked. It’s gotten to the point that I’ll probably resent him for playing well the next time he has an outstanding game sometime next month or whatever.

• Similarly, I can’t imagine why we’d ever need to play Navarro at left back again, barring perhaps Alberto being run over by a train. The kid has proven himself in games big and small, so play him. Case closed.

• Speaking of injuries and defensive personnel decisions, Spahic’s loan exit sure looked very suspect last night as we watched our CBs give up two goals by foolish mistakes in the first half hour of a game in which we absolutely could not concede. I know Del Nido said he left in part because he wanted to leave, but we must be down to whatever pesos we can still find in the couch cushions to make that move at this point in the season, with so much to play for and so much required to get it. An injury to any of our three remaining CBs means we don’t have the luxury of sitting whichever defensive liability looks to be the most disastrous on a particular week, and they haven’t looked especially inspiring, so that option is one I suspect we’ll miss at some point before the season’s over.

• And on the subject of what’s left for the season, our path to Europe is now only through the top end of the table. I’m not clear what the dual conditions of both CdR finalists qualifying for CL and Malaga’s disqualification from Europe will mean for qualifying for Europa. Usually the former scenario means that 7th place gets to go to Europa, but if Malaga finishes in the top 7, will their situation mean the last Europa spot is 8th? Regardless, the team clearly has some work to do, as there’s probably not going to be a scenario that sees 12th place doing anything but selling players all summer.

• Which brings me to my final point, which I was trying to make last week: we need to win these next three games against three bottom-dwelling squads. We need the points, we need the positive results, and we need the momentum.

Anyway, what do you guys think? Any takeaways from yesterday? What are your expectations and hopes for next season? Show the world your undying optimism or brutal realism in the comments below!

Breaking: Afellay Leaves Barca

As Monchi’s Men reported nearly two years ago and earlier this summer, Ibrahim Afellay has been loaned to Schalke 04 after an at times promising but largely ineffective stint watching Barca’s megastars from the bench. As we first reported the day he signed for Bareclona, Afellay leaves the club after a frustrating time of playing very well but never being good enough to overcome the first XI of expensive and highly-paid footballers, which anyone with eyes could see would happen during his stint with one of the biggest-spending clubs in the world. The transfer to the German club sees the talented midfielder head to the kind of club he should have signed for 18 months ago, as we noted at the time. As we explained at the beginning of the summer, his chances of becoming more than a really well-paid fan with a spectacular seat who occasionally got to stand on the field when games were beyond doubt were futher destroyed by the arrival of the next crop of Barca youngsters, a development that could be foreseen by basically any thinking person when Afellay signed for the club, as we detailed that very day as well as earlier this summer, when we were the first to report on this matter, out-reporting Marca, EMD, and Sport by 18 months.

An Open Letter to Arouna Koné

Mr. Koné,

Hey buddy! How’s that injured leg? Congratulations on your great season with Levante. I can honestly say, after watching you struggle in basically every opportunity you had to shine with Sevilla over your years here–including missing more impossible-to-miss-sitters than I can count–that it’s been a relief to see you finally succeed in the way Sevilla believed you could when they paid 12 million euros (a princely sum from a decidedly pauper club) for your services. True, I started out being frustrated that you were so inexplicably TERRIBLE every time you wore our jersey, but after awhile I started to just feel bad for you, and your success this season at Levante felt to me like relief and vindication for a truly talented player. Congratulations, for real.

But here’s the thing. I don’t understand why you’re so bitter at Sevilla. I can see why you said in November last year that you’d rather fail to score 18 goals than have to come back to your club–what player doesn’t want to stay where he’s found his form?–and even your many attempts to assure you could avoid a homecoming. It’s your right to go where you want, and obviously Sevilla would be crazy to play you, since you hate the club and apparently can’t score in the shirt. But why are you bitching and moaning and attacking Sevilla every chance you get this summer? What did they do to you, exactly? Was the club somehow preventing you from scoring any more than one single goal in the FORTY Liga games in which you played? Alternatively, was it Sevilla that caused your cruciate knee injury while playing for the Ivory Coast? Because they definitely paid for the surgery and brought you back to health. I don’t know how many chances you feel you’re entitled to, but you came on behind two of the greatest strikers the club has seen (Fabiano and Kanouté); if you wanted to claim a consistent starting spot, you needed to prove yourself with something more than .025 goals per appearance. It’s great to see some vim and vigor in a player, but you’re sounding more and more like the jilted lover who’s trying desperately to hide how bad she feels for being dumped. When she’s still talking about how much better off she is three months after the break-up, it starts to sound a little pathetic, and her friends start trying to change the subject.

Anyway, it’s enough already, Koné. I’m happy for your new success, but I’m also happy you’ll be somewhere else next season, because it seems like this relationship was always doomed to failure. So this is a win for both of us–you’re in a much better place, and we’re freed of an enormous failed investment. I’m not sure why you seem so unhappy to finally have some success away from Sevilla, but I think it’s time for you to move on. Burn your shoebox of Sevilla memories, stop bringing the club up in press conferences, and look forward to your season in Europe with Levante or some other club (who I’m SURE will continue to play you no matter how many goals you don’t score). Move on, buddy. Live well for your revenge. But please stop making me feel bad for you again.

The Afellay Principle

One reason this place always gets so quiet in the offseason is that we writers get busy with other projects (examples from the writers this summer: starting a new job, moving, travel, producing original community theater, etc). Another is that I can’t stand transfer season. I don’t enjoy the endless speculation, the wild click-bait headlines which produce their own click-bait headline-denying headlines, and the long-winded fantasies of what amazing players might come this year…if only money, geography, and possibly the space-time continuum weren’t factors (“What are Sevilla’s chances of signing a 1974 Maradona? What about a 2036 Bambinho? Click here to learn more!!!” (Terribly, terribly, really, terribly sorry about that. Ugh, I feel just awful about that. Really sorry.)).

But a paragraph by Kxevin in a post over at Barcelona Football Blog got me thinking, and thinking got me writing, and before I knew it, I had an offseason post. Kxevin writes that this summer Barca must:

Make a decision on Afellay. His talent is immense. His playing time will be minimal. He has skills as a winger, ball handler and attacker and is a unique player. The question is whether he is a unique player who will be happy with the playing time scraps that he will be getting from us next season. I am in favor of keeping him, as I think he does things that Cuenca/Tello can’t do. But if we keep him, we are going to have to actually use him, and integrate him into the side so that he isn’t Stranger in a Strange Land when he comes in. You could see him as part of an attacking trident that included Villa and Sanchez, or in midfield with Thiago for Copa matches and the like.

It’s an interesting problem Barca have with Afellay: they bought a very good player for very little money, and presumably believe he could become something great. But is there room for him in the squad? How do they develop him? How do they even play him at all? What’s his use in the squad? As Kxevin notes, he has a lot of talent and very little opportunity to play; a terrible combination for any player. If you’re a long-time reader of this space, it won’t surprise you that the above paragraph reminded me of when Barca signed Afellay, and of our response at the time, and of the conversation with Barca fans that happened both in the comments of that post and over at BFB. If you don’t feel like reading through internet comments of partisan soccer blogs (which would mean that you are an intelligent, reasonable person with important real-life things to attend to), I’ll summarize the exchange. On both sites, Sevilla fans lamented their club having followed Afellay closely for some time, only to have a much bigger club swoop in and grab him up; we lamented the loss of the player but also the likely loss of his chances to develop into a great player. Barca fans pointed out that Afellay was free to go where he wanted, and that Barca was free to sign who they wanted, and that finally Afellay very well could develop into a star within the confines of FCB. That led to a further discussion that gets at the point of this post, which feels like it needs its own paragraph (and this is getting long, so what the heck–let’s throw a jump in as well!).

Monchi on Twitter and Other News

As you may have already heard, Monchi–the man, the myth, the namesake of this blog–has joined Twitter. Normally I don’t get worked up when a new face comes to a social network, but Monchi’s arrival has been something special. Obviously, Monchi is widely seen as being a key figure in Sevilla’s glorious start to the 21st century, and his ability to find low-cost, promising talents where no one else was looking, develop them into stars in the process of winning SFC hardware, and then sell them off at a great profit is legendary. The opportunity to get any insight into how he thinks and sees the game is an incredible chance to understand the game and the inner workings of a truly unique and model club in European football, but of course top-level executives at clubs would never share anything interesting in a public forum like Twitter, right? (For the thrilling answer to this question read on…)

Monchi’s Men Guests at Forza Football!

I’m very excited to announce that Aaron and I wrote a guest post over at Forza Football’s fantastic site. In it, we discuss the transfer season and in particular Sevilla’s needs, wish list, and realities. Given how quickly Sevilla has gotten started this off-season, the content was already a bit behind the times in the day between when we wrote it and it was posted (during which time the club signed Diego Lopez and finalized the signing of Rabello), but that’s a good problem to have, instead of having to wait until the end of July for the team to make some moves. We certainly haven’t kept up with all the developments here, but the post there covers a lot of the latest news, so definitely run on over and check out both our article and all the other great content they’ve got on their site.

Anyway, hopefully we’ll have a few updates and retrospectives in the coming weeks, but I know that Aaron and I at least are a bit busy, so don’t hold your breaths. And if you’re a regular commenter who’d like to write something, definitely let us know, or at least keep the comments section popping!

La Recta Final: Sevilla and the Tightrope Between Success and Failure

We’ve arrived at the final stretch of the season, with four games left, and if not “everything” to play for, there’s certainly a lot on the table for Sevilla. As we approach the end of the season, I thought it’d be a good time to revisit the comments Del Nido made at this exact point in the first half of the season, before that rather unfortunate 2-6 drubbing we endured at home to Real Madrid. At the time, Del Nido was giving a speech for the Junta General de Accionistas, and he touched on various topics regarding the cub, offering many insights into how he runs the club, and why he makes some of the decisions he makes. The whole thing is worth a read, but I’ll just bring this quote over:

We close the sporting year 2010/2011 on the basis of what we can once again consider to be an economic, social, and sporting success. In broad numbers, for the ninth consecutive season the financial figures of the Administrative Counsel over which I preside show postive numbers in the most difficult season and environment in which we have directed the club. With a budget of close to 100 million euros, the unexpected elimination from the Champion League left us on the edge of the economic abyss, with expected losses in August 2010 of 30 million euros, which was the amount of money we’d expected to get from Champions or Champions and Europa League play.

Only the sales of Adriano…Konko, Zokora, Squillaci, Sergio Sánchez, and the last of the fees for Dani Alves and Marti, along with an improved TV contract…allowed us to close the financial year with a net gain of more than 400,000 euros. I can assure you that the majority of management’s efforts has been focused on recovering the economic loss of elimination from the Champions League. [...] That was our obligation as managers for having taken on so much risk, and fortunately we have been able to do it.

He then makes a couple key points, including that (and I’m quoting the other post here) normally we operate with a budget that assumes income of 55-60 million euros. If we have a good year like in 08/09, with CL, we add 20-25 million euros. Europa adds 8-15 million, depending on how far we go. Further, he states that if we’re not in a European competition, the goal is to land between 5-10th place. Again, the whole article is worth reading, it’s a great reminder of who and what this club is, what our limits are, and where we’re trying to be.

LFP’s Sevilla-Levante Debacle

Francisco de Goya, clearly anticipating April 13th, 2012, etched an etching. It was a terrifying etching. A sleeping man is devoured by a swarm of creatures of the night. The admonition reads: “El sueño de la razón produce monstruos.”

The world is full of wonders.

A Self-critique

Who are we?

a. A mid-table club with huge recent successes

b. A top club who is now in crisis

c. 11 men with a vague idea of football

The answer to this question probably depends on when we became fans of Sevilla. Fans who have come to the club in the last 6 years probably have a different perspective (if not a different answer) than those who have been around for a decade or more. Personally, I am constantly reassessing my understanding of the many narratives that are thrown out when discussing Sevilla’s place in La Liga. It’s appropriately hard for any Sevilla fan to hide his/her discontent with the current “underachieving” squad, even when this is exactly the achievement that Sevilla has had for decades. We must ask: by whose standards is this team to be judged? By those of the teams of recent years or by those of the last 4-5 decades of Sevilla football?